3 sks- Suggs goes complete HAM on them and puts himself in the CPOTY race.

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SnA ExclusiVeJoined: 01 Jun 2011Posts: 49882Location: Hillsboro, OR

Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 4:21 pm Post subject: Re: ....

bmorecareful wrote:

Anubiz wrote:

Flaccomania wrote:

To be fair though -- Flacco isn't playing against Leftwich, so the fact that Ben was out would have no impact on Flacco. I too wish Joe would have played better, but the Steelers defense, despite missing Troy, is still top 3 in the league. They took out our best WR, our best pass catching TE left with an injury, and they shut down our run game. So, while I too wish Joe played better, I certainly think given all of those circumstances he still played "ok" and by being careful with the ball, he put us in a position to win.

I'm not trying to defend him and say he played a great game -- he didn't. But I think in context he certainly didn't play horrible. I agree that if we want to win these types of games in the playoffs he'll have to play better, but we've seen Joe typically be able to step up when he's called to do so and I don't believe we would have seen any different last night if the scenario called for it.

As GTR always says, Joe is the hardest QB to figure out -- when the game is on the line he typically comes through, yet when we're up he typically craps the bed. Last night we saw us having a "decent" lead (in terms of Ravens/Steelers games, 6 points is a "decent" lead) and Joe continued to play smart and not crap the bed which is something we don't often see -- I look at that as a positive, personally.

I see that angle and those points you make are valid.

But this game was a bit of a microcosm of the dilemma of the future of this team especially at the QB position.

The rhetoric in the preseason and early on was that it's the offense that's going to have to lead this team now with the defense banged up and the leadership of this team on the defensive end being in the twilight of their careers.

& I fully believe that this team will only go as far as the offense/QB Joe Flacco takes it this year.

I think the optimism has to cease to a certain extent because this is his contract year -- and the size of this contract will be a VERY HUGE determining factor on where this team can go.

If Flacco wants to prove that he is a franchise QB, he just has to play far better and far more consistent.

This is the test for him. It's not about doing just enough to hold on for wins for me as a fan, but it's time for him to go out there and win these tough games on the road on his shoulders.

You can say I'm taking on the typical media pundit critic angle, but I think there is a lot of validity to it.

I'm just worried that we might have hit the ceiling with Flacco's potential and if that is the case... I don't know how comfortable I am in the future.

I think we played good last night. Pittsburgh came out guns blazing and gave us their best game plan defensively and we came out with no turnovers and a victory. Last night its not like flacco continually missed open receivers or we had any real threat on the play actions(the way the run blocking was) and the game was never to the point where opening it up was needed (especially once we saw that leftwich wasn't going to be able to beat us). Of course we would like to put points on the board but at the end of the day u play to win the game. It's Pittsburgh, we beat them 4 out of 5 they can say what they want but they were tired of losing to us I'm happy the defense finally won us one this year.

Except, you know, he did continuously miss open WR's, and throw in double coverage...

We can spread the blame around all we want, but this is how I boil it down:

1.) The gameplan by Cam was crap. Absolutely garbage. The scheme (IE don't turn the ball over) was good, but the play calls and routes were just asking for turnovers!

2.) The execution by Joe was horrible as well (forcing throws into double coverage aka trying to do too much, missing open WR's, not even going through his progressions at points, not making accurate deep throws, etc.)

3.) The in-game adjustments by Cam and Joe were equally as bad (trying to run the same routes to Boldin all game long, even after Pittsburgh adjusted to take away the crossing routes.

The only thing we did well was not turn the ball over. That's it. If Pittsburgh had ANY competent QB playing for them, we could and probably would have lost that game, but that's irrelevant. We executed the "don't win the game for us, but don't lose it for us, either" plan to perfection, kind of.

However, I'm interested in why people thought our offensive line was bad? Do you guys expect us to roll over Pittsburgh's #1 ranked defense? Do you guys expect Flacco to get 8 seconds in the pocket with Woodley/Harrison coming after him? I thought the offensive line did pretty well considering what they were up against. They didn't ever get beat in under 2 seconds, both of the sacks came after a 2-3 second window where Flacco's reads weren't open and he took a coverage sack._________________#FireDeanPees...and Chris Hewitt....and Matt Weiss

However, I'm interested in why people thought our offensive line was bad? Do you guys expect us to roll over Pittsburgh's #1 ranked defense? Do you guys expect Flacco to get 8 seconds in the pocket with Woodley/Harrison coming after him? I thought the offensive line did pretty well considering what they were up against. They didn't ever get beat in under 2 seconds, both of the sacks came after a 2-3 second window where Flacco's reads weren't open and he took a coverage sack.

It's not just about the sacks, the pocket was collapsing on Flacco pretty much all night, especially the interior. Hampton was brutalizing Birk all night which is a huge reason we had 0 run game. Flacco faced consistent pressure but he was able to A) get the ball out quickly or B) stand tall and get it out and take a hit._________________

I just got around to watching the game... I had to miss it and then rewind it.

Boring game.

Joe Flacco
Reading through the thread, I think the opinions saying Flacco had a bad game are off-base. Perhaps enough people haven't been paying attention to the Steelers defense the past few weeks, but Ike Taylor for the past couple seasons has been a legit top 5 corner in this league. I even mentioned in the Steelers GDT before the game that their best chance at stopping our offense was to contain Torrey and send extra help against Boldin/Pitta when needed.. and have Timmons cover Rice. Sure Flacco could've probably made a few more plays... but the only ones I thought he truly missed was the pass to Rice along the right sideline that was a sure first down (and he took the deep shot). There was also a pass on another play that looked like we had Ed Dickson open in the middle of the field that we could've went to. Other than that, I saw nothing.

Many of Flacco's "inaccurate" passes, were throw-aways. Even the deep ball to Jones on the Rice play looked like a throw-away. The line was decent, but were getting pushed back inside. But our WRs are the biggest issue IMO. Torrey Smith is our only guy that can get separation at a high level... but when he's seeing coverage against top 5-10 corners... it successfully stalls our offense. Torrey is the true engine of our offense, not Ray Rice. We could probably lose Rice to a season ending injury and sustain his loss better than we could sustain a loss of Smith.

If anything, last night's game solidifies in my mind the fact that we're not done addressing our offense. We need to go to the well once more. I want to see us draft Terrance Williams and finally give Flacco a guy beside Torrey that can truly be counted on to get separation. Flacco hasn't "reached his potential"- he's just not an elite QB that's going to carry a team on his back. Flacco is a really good QB like Matt Ryan that if you give him elite WR options, he'll give you elite QB play. Flacco mirrors the success of his receivers. Last night, he had a bad game... but still was able to manage the game.

And the notion that Leftwich outplayed Joe, I find absolutely laughable. Leftwich was gifted plenty of coverage breakdowns and wide open receivers... and he stilled missed on a good portion of his easy throws. Flacco saw tight coverage and faced the dilemma of a) trying to make the play and b) making sure you don't make a play for the other team. That's the Jay Cutler quandary. Sure Flacco could've been more aggressive, but forcing passes to be more impactful to the game only makes for a Jay Cutler- live by/die by approach. The Steelers have an elite secondary unit, completing passes against it were never going to be easy... and if that weren't enough the "Torrey Smith rules" limited our offense greatly.

Bernard Pierce
I was Pierce's biggest supporter directly after the draft. And I love what he brings to the team. I mentioned a few weeks ago that I thought we should be utilizing him more. That said, I think Rice is the more powerful runner. I think what makes Pierce so effective in comparison is his explosive ability. He has a very good first step to explode to hit the hole. Then he has great vision to take advantage of plays. Someone mentioned it in a past GDT... and I started watching more... and Ray Rice really has lost some of his explosive ability. I think while he's become more "complete" he's just not the same as what he once was before the extra muscle mass. Rice should remain our 3rd down back of course, but Pierce should see more 1st/2nd down opportunities. He shouldn't just be a breather back. He's too good for that.

Ravens Defense
I understand we got the win and all, but I'm not going to act like the defense has done anything special here. The defense looked no different to me than in most games they play... outside of the fact that they were playing a below average QB in Bryan Leftwich that was also playing injured. Our defense once again had blown coverages, the run game was once again able to be established by the opposing team. To me, I don't think the defense played that great a game really. I thought they played better than the offense, but they mainly benefited from the incompetence that was leading the Pittsburgh offensive unit... as in Leftwich.

That said we did make some key plays at key times that put us in good spots. Between interceptions, fumble's forced, etc. we looked pretty good. But make no mistake, just like the Raiders game- the talent level certainly helped to cover up some of the holes of our defense... and by talent level I mean Leftwich._________________

However, I'm interested in why people thought our offensive line was bad? Do you guys expect us to roll over Pittsburgh's #1 ranked defense? Do you guys expect Flacco to get 8 seconds in the pocket with Woodley/Harrison coming after him? I thought the offensive line did pretty well considering what they were up against. They didn't ever get beat in under 2 seconds, both of the sacks came after a 2-3 second window where Flacco's reads weren't open and he took a coverage sack.

It's not just about the sacks, the pocket was collapsing on Flacco pretty much all night, especially the interior. Hampton was brutalizing Birk all night which is a huge reason we had 0 run game. Flacco faced consistent pressure but he was able to A) get the ball out quickly or B) stand tall and get it out and take a hit.

The pocket was collapsing, but not instantly. It was collapsing theoretically when the ball should be getting released anways.

And as for Hampton, WTF do you think is going to happen when we just run dive plays all game long right into the strength of their defense?! They were giving us ZERO respect for our outside run run game, and you saw it on countless replays where Woodley and Harrison would just run right down the LoS and take their blocker with them.

Yeah, Flacco got rid of the ball, and it nearly got picked off several times or was nowhere near the intended WR._________________#FireDeanPees...and Chris Hewitt....and Matt Weiss

However, I'm interested in why people thought our offensive line was bad? Do you guys expect us to roll over Pittsburgh's #1 ranked defense? Do you guys expect Flacco to get 8 seconds in the pocket with Woodley/Harrison coming after him? I thought the offensive line did pretty well considering what they were up against. They didn't ever get beat in under 2 seconds, both of the sacks came after a 2-3 second window where Flacco's reads weren't open and he took a coverage sack.

I found this part of your post especially the emboldened part to be pretty humorous. The strength with the Steelers defense lies with their defensive backfield. Yet you question Joe's ability to make plays pass the football and simply being a game manager, but... yet you think we should temper down our expectations for the OL because they were battling pass rushers who have only 5 sacks on the season and are a) just not in a groove yet or b) they've begun to see some decline in their game (and by they, I mean James Harrison to be exact).

Flacco had to rush many passes and even on some of his throw aways, he was being blasted to the ground. The OL also didn't look very in sync for the running game. So what measure should I view them competent in.. because they simply didn't have a good night at all. They looked sloppy as blockers._________________

Flacco took a devastating hit from Brett Keisel on the very first play of our first possession. This could explain some of his hurried throws. I thought the pocket held up pretty well considering who we were playing._________________

[And as for Hampton, WTF do you think is going to happen when we just run dive plays all game long right into the strength of their defense?! They were giving us ZERO respect for our outside run run game, and you saw it on countless replays where Woodley and Harrison would just run right down the LoS and take their blocker with them.

We were mostly running outside zone plays and Hampton was just blowing up the plays so quickly that it didn't matter (not to mention Bajema and Dickson were getting steamrolled on the outside). Like I said, I think the tackles held up pretty well but the interior line was just so pathetic that it rendered the offense almost helpless at a lot of times. Flacco was getting the ball out quickly but the pocket was never clean and he took a lot of shots even when he was getting the ball out almost immediately after the snap. That he was never able to step up in the pocket was more damaging for him I think than if it had been Harrison and Woodley terrorizing him from the edge, it sort of made it so that he had nowhere to go because he didn't want to be moving too laterally in the pocket and thus move himself closer to those edge rushers. Birk, to me, just looks completely done and while he has the veteran savvy, part of me wonders how ready Gradkowski is right now for big league play.

That Pittsburgh has a good defense doesn't make the the play of the offensive line any better, it just means they got whipped by a good unit. This isn't about how the offensive line performed relative to expectations, it's about how they played, and the fact that they played poorly when we expected them to doesn't make that play any better, it just means they played poorly._________________

The pocket was collapsing, but not instantly. It was collapsing theoretically when the ball should be getting released anways.

Yeah, on short routes. Had we tried to attempt a few more shots down field, Flacco would have been sacked several more times. They were blowing up the inside of our line basically all night, blockers getting pushed right back into Flacco. I never argued it was "instantly", but it was a lot sooner than you'd like an OL to start collapsing and it was consistent nearly all night.

Quote:

And as for Hampton, WTF do you think is going to happen when we just run dive plays all game long right into the strength of their defense?! They were giving us ZERO respect for our outside run run game, and you saw it on countless replays where Woodley and Harrison would just run right down the LoS and take their blocker with them.

So you're agreeing that Hampton kept crashing through our OL?

Quote:

Yeah, Flacco got rid of the ball, and it nearly got picked off several times or was nowhere near the intended WR.

Several of those "nowhere near the intended WR" were throw aways that Joe likes to keep close to his WRs for whatever reason (even the ones out of bounds, he just slightly sails it over their heads when the coverage is too tight).

Again, I'm not arguing he had a good game by any means, but considering the circumstances, I think he played "ok" and far from "awful"._________________

part of me wonders how ready Gradkowski is right now for big league play.

I've been wondering that too -- with how poorly the OL has been and even how much shuffling we've had already, we haven't heard Gradkowski's name even mentioned in potential starters at LG when we were in flux there. Makes me think he's well behind the curve._________________

If Joe Flacco wants to be seen as an elite quarterback in this league then he canít have outings like this. The Steelers played pretty well on defense, but Flacco was missing receivers all night long on routine passes that simply have to be completed at this level. He finished the game with a -4.0 grade and just 164 passing yards. Only one of his incompletions can be chalked up to a drop. The worst part of his performances was how inept he was in a completely clean pocket. On plays where he felt no pressure he threw for just 4.5 yards per attempt and had a passer rating of only 72.1. The bottom line is this is an unacceptable performance for an NFL starting quarterback, and he was lucky the Ravens were able to escape with a win. If he wants to make good on that claim of elite play, he needs to kick it into high gear_________________#FireDeanPees...and Chris Hewitt....and Matt Weiss

I was fine with Flacco. I had zero doubt if we needed him to get us a TD at the end Sunday he would have. When we got down to four minutes and we needed to burn some time what did we do? We took 2 minutes off the clock and made them burn all their timeouts. I don't think we are going to do anything more than we need to until January._________________

I was fine with Flacco. I had zero doubt if we needed him to get us a TD at the end Sunday he would have. When we got down to four minutes and we needed to burn some time what did we do? We took 2 minutes off the clock and made them burn all their timeouts. I don't think we are going to do anything more than we need to until January.

So then in January we're just supposed to "flip the switch" and remember how to win games with our offense?

I was fine with Flacco. I had zero doubt if we needed him to get us a TD at the end Sunday he would have. When we got down to four minutes and we needed to burn some time what did we do? We took 2 minutes off the clock and made them burn all their timeouts. I don't think we are going to do anything more than we need to until January.

So then in January we're just supposed to "flip the switch" and remember how to win games with our offense?

Call me skeptical, but I don't believe that approach will work.

Just look what we've done all year.

Our offense just straight killed Cincy.

Flacco gets Jacoby for the game winner against Philly when we needed it.

Patriots, we play a great offensive game and when we need points at the end we get them with ease.

Second Browns game, we need a FG at the end, Flacco gets us a TD with ease.

We flat out light the Raiders up.

Cowboys. Matched them point for point. Got what we needed at the end.

Only time we needed the offense to come through for us and they didn't was against Houston and I think Cam just abandoned the run and it got away.

I get how everyone is deceived here. I really do understand it. It doesn't look pretty and at times just looks flat. But that's exactly what is going on here. Everyone is deceived._________________

One more thing. I am almost 100% sure that come playoff team we are going to see a lot more no huddle. We're going to see more complete offensive performances through the entire game and people aren't going to believe what they are seeing._________________

One more thing. I am almost 100% sure that come playoff team we are going to see a lot more no huddle. We're going to see more complete offensive performances through the entire game and people aren't going to believe what they are seeing.